College Players Deserve More

According to Mark Koba of NBC News $10.6 billion was generated by college athletics in 2012.

Out of the 450,000 college athletes not a single one of them have a piece of that pie. They are simply compensated with a full or partial scholarships. Somehow that seems to be fair in the eyes of the NCAA.

So to bring you up to speed the NCAA makes billions, the schools make hundreds of millions, the coaches make millions, and the players have an opportunity to get a "great education." The numbers just don't add up.

Furthermore the education is solely based on how good the athlete is in the first place, they don't simply give away scholarships to everyone that wants to join the team. So the more likely you are to succeed as a professional athlete the less important the education aspect is.

"If a student-athlete is hurt or unsuccessful, the coaches and administrators suddenly discard the noble ideals of "education" and a player is left with nothing. Fans would no doubt feel differently about the issue if a student-athlete was in their own family," said Brian Frederick, a board member of Sports Fans Coalition.

According to a report by the National College Players Association and Drexel University, the fair market value for an average college football player is $178,000. Where the big name athletes, such as Johnny Manziel would have earned closer to half a billion in his two years as a starting quarterback at Texas A&M University.

Whether or not you are a Heismen Trophy winner or a back up kicker you are still part of a team and more importantly a brand. A brand that according to ESPN.com is making hundreds of millions of dollars each year on your account, but football isn't even the highest earning sport in the NCAA.

There is one event related to one sport that surpasses anything else in a matter of three weeks.
The event I'm taking about is the College Basketball Tournament, more commonly known as "March Madness."

According to Zach Cheney-Rice of policymic.com, TV ad earnings alone surpassed $1 billion in 2012. In the same year the NBA, MLB and NHL playoffs combined only produced $991 million. Yet players in those leagues are sufficiently compensated because they are professionals.

What really separates an amateur from a professional in this case? Is it their age? No because basketball players only have to play one year of college and both the MLB and NHL can draft players straight out of high school.

What separates an amateur and a professional is a salary. Amateur in this case is just a word that legally dismisses the obligation to reimburse players for the work that they do.

Shabazz Napier, the starting guard and captain of the current national champions Connecticut Huskies, is one of the best college basketball players in the country and recently told the world that he goes to bed sometimes "starving."

"He says he's going to bed hungry at a time when millions of dollars are being made off of him. It's obscene. This isn't a Connecticut problem. This is an NCAA problem, and I want to make sure we're putting pressure on them to treat athletes well," said Connecticut State Rep. Matthew Lesser.

Players can no longer stand by and watch the money they produce, on their own, slip right past them and into the hands of the NCAA.

Imagine a college player that spends 40-50 hours a week to achieve his dream to be a professional athlete, but behind that dream is a single parent with multiple children working two jobs just to keep their house from foreclosing.


Without the NCAA regulation that forces players to play at least one year of college when talking about basketball and three years when talking about football, the majority of players would have a salary in the hundreds of thousands and would be able to support his or her struggling family.

If the NCAA needs the star players for at least one year to ensure their ratings don't dive and their revenue stays in the hundreds of millions, then the players should get what they deserve, and what they deserve is a big piece of an enormous pie.

At A Glance:
$10.6 Billion were generated by the NCAA in 2012.
"March Madenss" generated more than NBA, NHL and MLB playoffs combined.
Athletes going to bed "starving."

Eric Mckenzie: LBCC's ITS President

We all come to a point in our lives when we finally find something we love doing. That point where you wake up one day, look yourself in the mirror and without words you realize you're exactly where you're supposed to be.

For Eric Mckenzie, an LBCC welding student and the president of the Industrial Technical Services (ITS) club, this moment happened when he moved here from Southern California to pursue his interest in welding.

29 Palms, where Mckenzie is from, there isn't much to do and it's hard to stay motivated out in the desert and away from big cities.

"Traditional class room settings were always a little tough for me, that's why I enjoy welding so much, I'm hands on at all times and I'm actually getting job experience while in school," said Mckenzie

Mckenzie doesn't just represent himself but an entire organization of welders alike. ITS helps out a lot of people every year, locally and globally. This year ITS is creating a bell that will be donated to the Wounded Warrior Project.

They have also helped out around the campus, by welding a new cart for the Commuter's paper deliverer, and also helped improve the athletic facility, by welding all new racks for the zumba room.

Behind all of these projects you will find an amazing group of people and behind them you will find a man doing what ever he can to help them all.

 "He is always willing to help, and promptly addresses and situation that involves the ITS department, that's what makes him such a good president," said fellow ITS member Colby Cantrell.

Past the biker beard, steel toed boots, and flame retardant jacket, that ironically has red flames on it, there is motivated man with a very calm demeanor. All of Mckenzie's work with the ITS department helps hundreds of student every year pay for expensive certification classes and tests.

 "He is a really big motivator to the rest of the students, really outgoing and energetic about welding, "said Fred Stuewe who is the Co-Chair of the ITS department and current welding instructor.

Though sometimes the breaks and off times consist of conversations that one may here in a bar or from a group of veterans, when it's time to get down to business, welders make the transition faster than anyone I have ever seen.

Some days Mckenzie has 12 hour days, eight of which are in the shop, the remaining four are in a classroom so that he can receive his contractor's certification, which would allow him to work as a welder while still in school.

What you don't hear from him is a single complaint. What you do hear from him is the excitement in his voice, that after each day there is a renewed sense of accomplishment.

You can see how much welding means to him and how much pride he has in himself and the ITS department as a whole.

In the future Mckenzie hopes to get his general contractor's license and start his own welding company, but welding can be a very profitable occupation so working for a well established company wouldn't be to bad either.

Where ever Mckenzie ends up in the job market doesn't matter because he knows he will be the best welder that he can be, and that in itself will be a dream come true.

At A Glance:
Eric Mckenzie
ITS President
26 years old
A second year student at LBCC
Hobbies: Anime and Soccer